I reached again, coaxing and pulling until the pain in my head forced me to stop.
Yes.
There was a clear difference in the shadows around Alches now.
There was a rustle as Lowen maneuvered himself into a better position to see. “How are you doing that?”
I didn’t know. Nor did I care.
It was working. Although slowly.
I worked with the shadows, not giving up even when it felt like someone had embedded razor blades in my mind.
After what felt like a century later, I checked on my progress.
Inches. That’s all I had managed to claw toward me. Less than a foot in total.
At this rate, it would take weeks or months for them to reach me. Deborah would be long dead by then. Me too, probably.
I sagged in my bonds, hope abandoning me.
The tree’s influence blunted my thoughts and emotions, until I forgot what I was doing. I drifted, my mind wandering to strange places as the world took on a dream-like quality.
Half of me remained bound by the tree roots, just conscious enough to be aware of my surroundings. The rest of me found myself in the charred remains of a forest.
The fine particles of ash on the ground clung to my bare feet as I walked through the ruined remains of what had once been my mental forest. By instinct, my path led me to a meadow that was the twin of the one where my physical body rested.
The blackened husk of an ancient oak tree stood in its center. A dead thing whose presence cast a pall over the destruction all around me.
Sorrow over its plight squeezed my heart. The sense of something important being lost plaguing me. Before I could figure out what that something was, the caw of a crow drew my attention upward.
A black bird landed on the oak’s dead branches; its beady eyes focused on me.
We stared at each other for several seconds before the flapping of wings grew into a thunderous roar.
A murder of crows circled in the sky high above. Right over the oak tree.
Wind whipped hair into my face as the sense that I hovered on the cusp of some great revelation tickled the back of my mind.
The oak tree. The crows. All of it connected somehow.
Before I could figure out what that was, I was pulled partially back into the clearing. My subconscious picking up on something my waking mind had overlooked.
I was no longer alone in the meadow.
There were dozens standing in the open field and the trees beyond. A veritable army of Red Caps, a few Fae that I recognized as being part of the Lucies. They were outnumbered by the vampires gathered around Vitus, Navya, and Sofia.
Saul was there too. Almost unnoticed where he stood among the trees, a cloak of smoke obscuring his lower half.
I found Arlan not far from Breandan’s cage. His face carefully blank as his gaze caught mine. He waited until I was focused on him before his gaze strayed toward the eldritch, standing in the king’s shadow. Inara perched on the creature’s shoulder, her face tight and set.
I got the vague feeling that Arlan was trying to tell me something with that glance, but my brain felt too slow to figure it out.
Muiredach leveled a look of distaste on the vampires. “Was it really necessary to bring so many?”
“You don’t know Thomas and Liam like I do. They will come for her. It’s best to be prepared,” Vitus responded.
“They may come, but they will not find her. The illusions around Summer’s Heart are impenetrable.”
